"heroic happy dead" is a line from the e.e. cumings poem "next to of course God, America" where a pompous politician is giving a hackneyed version of the Gettysberg Address with all the usual buzz words.
So. It seems we don't treat our military dead a heck of a lot better than those who dug the mass graves in Bosnia.
So what?
Here's what. From my posts in a Talk Lubbock thread.
Dead is dead. It is not logical to fret about whether all body parts of your loved one are in the casket or urn or whether somebody elses are mixed in or are there instead. Those were my sentiments concerning those graves that were moved up near Chicago way: so what?
It is only a question of respect and of due care. And of hypocrisy and lies, since the remains of U.S. soldiers are claimed to be so carefully honored, which is a crock anyway. Empty propaganda. "We honor your sons and husbands and fathers so much that we pay them little and curse them and kick at them during boot camp and send them off to die for no good reason but once they are dead, we are very considerate of the integrity of their remains and spare no expense to bring them back as whole as possible." Shit.
If I went somewhere and died or was killed, I'd just as soon be buried or burned there or left to rot on the roadside. It's appropriate, poetic, to lie where you fall. Used to be the common lot of all soldiers.
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The problem is, we shot ourselves in the foot. We need those happy heroic dead to use as a recruiting tool. That's why this is so bad, not because of the soldiers or their families or hurt feelings.
Live soldiers are too likely to be homeless or to have a problem with D & A or psychosis or complaints about Agent Orange or some obscure caustic or infective substance found in the sand dunes of Saudi Arabia. Dead soldiers do not talk back or disappoint or talk to the press later. I mean, sure they're dead and maybe it was because of mistakes theirs or ours but we can spin that. Do all the time. Rearranging the facts is only one of the functions of the Pentagon and DoD.
All that ponp and ceremony over dead soldiers is a recruiting tool. It gives old soldiers who ought to know better the chance to talk about patriotism and sacrifice and the costs of freedom (never mind that invading places on the other side of the globe has not a fucking thing to do with our freedom) and it gives young soldiers and prospects the achy weepy feeling of courage and resolution and flag-waving that so impresses their otherwise apt to be neglectful girlfriends and/or wives and friends.
So when corpses are not treated with absurd ceremony and respect, it makes us think, "our government doesn't care, they are using us" and so they are and have been so many times in the past, when we have gone to war because of a politicians mistakes or ambition or plain foolishness.
They don't want us to know that we are just pawns they push around on a checkerboard the size of the world. We don't want to know that either, or rather to be reminded of it, obecause it makes us feel so small and makes our lives so meaningless. We willingly join in the big deception. We want to be deceived. We beg to be included in the deception. We'll even help write the script.
Next time you listen to the GOP pseudo-debates, keep yore ear tuned to see which of those bastards has plans for you and your children on some battleline they deem significant to them. And let me tell you, some of them do have plans, for yore money and yore offspring's lives and blood.
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